Philippa Jackson is completing research at the Warburg Institute in London on the patronage of Pandolfo Petrucci, the leading citizen of the Sienese republic at the beginning of the sixteenth century. She has written on the cult of Mary Magdalen under his regime and is currently preparing a book entitled Pandolfo Petrucci: Politics and Patronage in Renaissance Siena. Her major interests are in Renaissance cultural history and cardinals of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries.

Fabrizio Nevola teaches at the Università degli Studi di Siena. He has held fellowships at the Canadian Centre for Architecture (Montreal) and Villa I Tatti, The Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies (Florence) and was AHRB Research Fellow at the University of Warwick (2001-4). His research focus is on the architectural and urban history of Renaissance Siena. He has published numerous articles (e.g. Art Bulletin, 2000 and Renaissance Studies, 2003) and has a book forthcoming entitled Architecture and Government in Renaissance Siena: Fashioning Urban Experience (1400-1555).